In the spring of 1997 I visited le Musée Fabre in Montpellier and saw an oil painting entitled Une Jeune Fille (A Little Girl). I was reminded of how girls have historically been depicted in terms of sexuality as a subject of fantasy in French art. The girl is modeled after a real girl, but she is an innocent being created by the artist's imagination. She is not the image of the real girl, but a girl possessing the body of an innocent woman as an "idea" (ideal) apart from reality. As it is very difficult to depict such a girl in photography at present, I decided to create a photograph which would have the viewer imagine an innocent girl as a new "idea" in the contemporary society. I did the shooting in the spring 1998 in Tokyo.

The Reason of Life

This is the view of what men dream of but can never be at the point to see. Many men have a lot of desire to see the underwear beneath a woman's skirt. At the same time many women think about having their underwear looked at by men. This desire is never spoken of in public. The woman is photographed by the artist at the same moment as the woman photographs herself. The camera can be a very good excuse to connect men's and women's desires.

Noritoshi Hirakawa is known for his work which explores elements of the social structure that are well-recognized but rarely addressed. He was born in Fukuoka, Japan in 1960 and currently lives in New York. This is his second exhibition at Deitch Projects.